Child Workers

Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday—May 3-5, 2011—Gracias to Santa Rosa de Copan to Copan Ruinas

As I wrote before, I decided to head to Santa Rosa on Tuesday rather than spend another day in Gracias.  The trip was a beautiful one through the mountains in a single bus, and I was in town by 10:00.  Of course, the bus stop is on the edge of town and town is on top of a mountain, so I had to walk about 1.5 km (0.9 mile) to get there.  Then, because there was no map in my guidebook, I had to ask several people how to find my hotel—the Posada de Carlos y Blanca.  Tourism is really down here in Honduras.  I’ve realized that as each place I stay ends up having few guests.  I am the only one here at the Posada. 

I immediately went out exploring the town of Santa Rosa.  It is much nicer than Gracias—cleaner, bigger, nicer colonial buildings, etc.  While out, I found a laundry and dropped off my clothes.  When I went to pick them up this morning in Gracias, the woman still hadn’t washed them.  The fact that she hadn’t caused me to have to pay 80% more to get them done!

Having had breakfast at the hotel, I wasn’t hungry for lunch.  Instead, I had a pineapple liquado at a local place.   I waited until the late afternoon to eat.  I went to a small place recommended by an American who lives here.  Unfortunately, everyone hear speaks Spanish back to you as if you understand every word they say.  What I ended up getting as “typical” was another breakfast identical to the one I had this morning and to the one I had already ordered at my hotel for tomorrow morning.

Wednesday morning, it was hard to face another breakfast.  Not only that, but my stomach didn’t feel right.  I had no diarrhea, but I kept burping and having a full, uneasy feeling.  Also, I felt as if I had a light fever.  I forced breakfast down.  During the rest of the day, I burped it up and the smell of food on the streets was a turn-off for me.  After being out for a couple of hours in the morning, I just decided to stay inside all afternoon.  Then I decided not to even go out to eat—just to go to bed and lose some weight.

Before going to bed on Wednesday, I asked if I could get a desayuno Americana tomorrow morning.  Again, I got long paragraphs of words in response.  I knew I didn’t want pancakes when I heard the word for that, but I am not sure what I agreed to.  I just went to bed hoping that Thursday would not bring another typico breakfast.  I took some Advil to try to help me feel better.  It didn’t seem as if I needed anything for my stomach since all I was doing was burping.

I awoke Thursday morning feeling better, but still having some pressure in my stomach.  Unfortunately, I was presented with a typico breakfast when I went to the dining room.  I had noticed that it was the smell of the tortillas that had made me feel most uncomfortable yesterday, so I ate most of the breakfast while avoiding them.  

It took two buses to get to Copan Ruinas.  Finally, I am in a town with other tourists.  It is the only place I have been in Honduras where I am not alone.  And the town itself is attractive and has lots of facilities for tourists.  Unfortunately, it also has higher prices than anywhere else in Honduras and most of the other places I have visited on this trip.  

I got a room at a place which had not responded to an e-mail last week.  They said their wifi was down part of last week, so that must have been the reason they didn’t respond.  Anyway, I got the last room—a two-room dormitory with a private bath which they rented to me as a private room since even here in Copan Ruinas the number of tourists compared to the number of available places to stay is low.  

Most of the afternoon, I just walked the streets exploring the town.  It was nice to see all the restaurants, bars, and shops.  By 16:00, I was hungry.  Wanting something different, I went to a sandwich shop which was highly recommended and ordered a burger, fries, and cola.  It tasted so good. 

Since then, I have been in my room reading on a new book I have started.  It is now 19:00.  I may go out exploring after this post; otherwise I will just read some more.

Speaking of reading, I just finished The Welsh Girl by Peter Ho Davies.  Set in Wales during the last days of WWII, I really enjoyed the story.  I gave the book 3 1/2 stars out of 4.

Now before ending tonight, I want to mention the problem of child labor in Central America.  And by child labor, I mean children as young as 8 years old.  It's been obvious in every country that many young children are not going to school.  Instead, they are working at bus stops, on city streets, etc., selling things to make money for their families.  How sad it is that countries still allow this to happen.  These children, without an education, will never become more than peasants.  And as adults they will have children so that they can go out and work to support them.  It remains never ending unless the government puts a stop to it.  It's been a major problem in Asia, too.  But some countries there seem to be making an effort to change things.  One of the Salvadorans who talked to me on a bus trip was greatly concerned about the problem.  I can see why.